1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to balloons and more particularly to a novel balloon that is inexpensive and can safely be used by children.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Balloons are popular as toy or novelty items. At present, such balloons are sold in two widely available forms, namely those made of a stretchable material, usually latex, and those made of unstretchable material, usually nylon (a polyamide), Mylar (a polymer; Mylar is a registered trademark of E. I. DuPont de Nemours and Company), or xe2x80x9cmylar,xe2x80x9d the name commonly albeit erroneously applied to a replacement for Mylar made of an outer layer of nylon laminated to an inner layer of polyethylene. Latex and other balloons made of a stretchable material may be sold either collapsed or inflated. Balloons made of unstretchable material are nearly always sold in inflated form.
Whether sold inflated or uninflated, balloons made of unstretchable material are filled to the desired pressure with a desired fluid such as air or helium and then sealed by tying the neck off with a string or the like or crimping the neck with a clip or a cup-and-stick support assembly, or by means of a heat seal or a self-sealing valve. Regardless of the sealing technique used, such balloons when inflated may thereafter be supported or held by means of a holder, which is typically a funnel-shaped plastic cup formed at one end of a plastic stick and having means such as apertures or slots for use in securing the balloon to the cup and stick.
Examples of these prior art holders are disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,715,841 and 4,895,545. Such holders are normally used with balloons that have a diameter less than about 18 inches when inflated and that are sealed with heat. U.S. Pat. Nos 5,306,194 and 5,334,072 describe an alternative structure including a common drinking straw that functions as an inflation tube when it is inserted into the tail of a balloon containing a self-seal valve. When the balloon is inflated, the balloon""s air pressure seals the valve, which grips the straw to form a rigid holder. U.S. Pat. No. 4,486,975 describes a different construction for holding a non-balloon inflatable novelty item comprising an uninflated cavity in which a hand is inserted.
The most popular type of balloon holder consists of a funnel-shaped cup for receiving and crimping the neck of a balloon to seal and/or secure it. The cup is sometimes integrally attached to a stick by which the balloon is held. The cup is typically provided with a plurality of holes or slots for engaging the neck of the balloon to crimp the neck both to seal it and to secure the balloon to the cup. By way of example, the neck of the balloon is threaded through and wound around the slotted cup and secured to the holder near its end. The body of the balloon is thereby intended to nest into and be supported by the funnel-shaped cup of the balloon holder. Still another type of balloon holder known heretofore, referred to as the xe2x80x9cclip""n stick,xe2x80x9d consists of a stick with an integral loop and clip to seal and/or secure the balloon and its inlet portion.
Such prior types of balloon holders are difficult to manipulate, the balloon is not firmly secured and has a tendency to separate from the holder, and refilling of the balloon with a desired fluid such as air or helium is cumbersome. The cup and the tied-off neck of the balloon are, moreover, unsightly. A more serious matter is that a rigid stick or straw can injure a child who falls on it. Finally, no matter how they are manufactured, the cup, stick or straw portion of such a balloon holder adds undesirable cost to the overall manufacturing and commercializing process.
There are other disadvantages to the prior types of balloon holders. For example, the difficulty of attaching the popular cup and stick holders to the balloons has heretofore frequently placed the burden of doing so on manufacturers or distributors in advance of sale to the retailer, thereby necessitating inflation of the balloons and attachment of the cup and stick to the inflated balloon before transporting the product and increasing the cost and the storage space required to handle the product prior to sale. This difficulty has also discouraged or prevented virtually any meaningful sales to consumers of uninflated balloons made of unstretchable material.
Latex balloons also have serious problems. The U.S. 1994 Child Safety Protection Act requires the following warning label on the front of all latex balloon packages and displays: xe2x80x9cCHOKING HAZARDxe2x80x94Children under 8 years can choke or suffocate on uninflated or broken balloons. Adult supervision required. Keep inflated balloons from children. Discard broken balloons at once.xe2x80x9d Latex balloons also threaten the health and even the lives of children and adults who suffer from latex allergy.
FIGS. 8-10 illustrate some representative structures of the prior art.
FIG. 8 shows a balloon-tail assembly for a helium-fill balloon made of unstretchable material and comprising a self-seal valve 40 and an inlet 41, with a channel for fluid flow. The tail assembly is too small and flexible to form a holder capable of properly supporting a relatively large, heavy balloon main body 42. In addition, this short tail 43 has a pinched rounded end 44 to facilitate the secure attachment of a tether for a floating balloon.
FIG. 9 shows a helium-fill balloon made of unstretchable material. An inflation probe or nozzle 45 inserted in the valve within the tail 46 preempts a great deal of space within the tail assembly.
FIG. 10 shows a balloon-tail assembly for an air-filled smaller balloon 47 made of unstretchable material. It has an inflation port 48 and channel to communicate air to a channel 49 that is intentionally minimized to facilitate both heat sealing near the throat 50 and threading the uninflated bottom portion 51 around a prior-art hard plastic cup and/or stick holder.
An object of the invention is to remedy the problems of the prior art outlined above. In particular, an object of the invention is to provide a balloon that is inexpensive and can be easily inflated and safely used by children.
Another object of the invention is to provide a balloon that can be sold as a toy or novelty item and that is unusually inexpensive, even for an item of this type, to manufacture, transport, display and vend.
One object of the present invention is to provide a handle for a balloon, having means for tightly and securely holding a balloon, including one having a diameter of over nine inches, which would generally be too large to be affixed to and properly supported by the prior types of stick-with-cup or straw-with-self-seal valve holders.
Another object of the present invention is to form a balloon holder in such a way as to eliminate the cost of the prior type of balloon-holding stick-with-cup, eliminate the labor required to attach the balloon to such stick-with-cup holder, efficiently and economically form the holder coincident with present-day sealing processes, and provide a more reliable attachment and vertical retention of the balloon relative to the holder.
Yet another object of the present invention is to provide a holder for such a balloon which may be used in conjunction with either a heat-sealed closure for the balloon or a self-sealing valve.
Still another object of the present invention is to provide a holder for such a balloon that enables the balloon to be quickly and easily inflated and sealed, thereby facilitating inflation by retailers or the public so as to reduce costs heretofore incurred for shipping inflated balloons with sticks and/or cups attached and to eliminate concomitant costs for damaged or unsalable xe2x80x9cleakers.xe2x80x9d
A further object of the present invention is to provide a holder that permits the balloon to be manufactured from lighter gauge plastic than has heretofore been necessary to avoid or minimize shipping and handling damage to pre-inflated balloons.
A still further object of the present invention is to provide a safe balloon/holder combination that, by facilitating consumer inflation and assembly, opens new markets for air-filled plastic balloons, such as self-service mass merchandiser multi-packs, greeting cards, manufacturer and retailer premiums, advertising specialties, direct mail inserts and point of purchase signs.
A yet further object of the present invention is to provide a holder especially adapted for nylon or other polymer film that will enable such balloons to fully exploit their advantages vis-à-vis latex balloons of easier inflation and sealing, safer use by children, greater attractiveness, greater suitability for graphics and messages, and greater resistance to bursting or loss of air due to other causes.
The foregoing and other objects of the invention are attained by providing a balloon comprising an inflatable main body with an inflatable extension, wherein the extension is connected to the main body in such a manner that, when they are inflated, the extension forms a balloon handle.
The balloon is preferably made of an unstretchable material such as polyethylene (high density, low density, or a blend of the two), nylon or a nylon-polyethylene laminate, and is intended for sale as a novelty item or toy balloon for use by children.
In accordance with an independent aspect of the present invention there is provided a non-latex toy balloon comprising:
two overlying coterminous sealable panels of substantially unstretchable flexible film having edge seals joining said panels together to define an inflatable main body with an integral inflatable extension connected by a throat and enclosing an interior space;
an inflation port formed in one of the main body, the throat and the extension for communicating a fluid to the interior space; and
a seal for sealing the inflation port.